Jorge Ruiz Lara ELA: Write a Review

Music Review
Racine Carrée is a new album released on August 2013 by the Belgian musician, Stromae.
The album has thirteen songs, including Papaoutai and Formidable, two of his most famous
songs. This album is the perfect definition of Stromae’s music. His music can’t be defined as
Pop, Electro or House, each of his songs has its own genre and style. Caribbean, African and
House music were incorporated to create Stromae’s masterpiece, Racine Carrée.

This album was a big commercial success, especially in French-speaking countries (Stromae
sings in French), selling more than one million copies in France and topped the charts in
France, Belgium, Switzerland, Italy and the Netherlands, as well as reaching the top ten in
Canada.

Stromae’s music can be really different depending on your mood, if you are happy, you will
dance and enjoy Stromae’s rhythms. If you are sad, you will listen to the lyrics by which his
music is also well-known. The album has an intention of social criticism in themes such as
racism, homophobia, paternity or smoking.

His most successful song, Papaoutai (which means “Dad, where are you?”) relates
Stromae’s childhood. In the music video a young boy tries to interact with his father, who is
represented as a mannequin. Stromae lost his father in 1994, he was murdered during the
Rwandan Genocide.

After his first hit, in 2009, with Alors On Danse, Stromae was designed a One-hit wonder
singer by a few critics. Literally “Stromae will just be another Pop singer, who only will sing
about love.” That’s why he wrote Formidable. In Formidable he sings about love, but not in
the way that the critics expected. He criticizes it and the problems it can cause.

Formidable’s music video is a hidden camera in Brussels, where he acts like drunk. He
screams and cries in the middle of the street. He wants to show us ‘’societies’ indifference’’
to people with affective disorders.

There are other songs with critical intention in Racine Carrée, for expample, Tous les mêmes
criticizes men’s stereotypical attitude and behavior, in Quand ¨C’est? he complains about
smoking and cancer and Bâtard is a confrontation with all kind of prejudices, such as racist or
homophobic ones, and in Moules frites, he sings about poverty and hunger criticizing
Governments’ and people’s indifference about them.

I admire Stromae and his ability to include social criticism and meaningful lyrics in the world
of electronic music. His thoughts about social issues, his knowledges of music, production
and his creativity, make him more than an average singer in this declining music industry,
Jorge Ruiz Lara ELA: Write a Review

where quantity is way more appreciated than quality, where powerful lyrics or innovation
have been replaced by ordinary and dull songs.